Power Generation
A pulp and paper mill (at Témiscaming) and several hydroelectric dams have been constructed on the river. In 1950, the dam at Rapides-des-Joachims, was built, forming Holden Lake behind it and thereby submerging the rapids and portages at Deux Rivières. These hydro dams, like all dams on rivers, have had negative effects upon shoreline and wetland ecosystems, and are thought to also be responsible for the near extermination of American eels, which were once an abundant species in the river, but which are now uncommon . As an economic route, its importance was eclipsed by railroad and highways in the 20th century. It is no longer used for log driving, however, it is still extensively used for recreational boating. Some 20,000 pleasure boaters visit the Carillon Canal annually.
Today, Outaouais Herald Emeritus at the Canadian Heraldic Authority is named after the river.
Read more about this topic: Ottawa River
Famous quotes containing the words power and/or generation:
“It cannot be denied that for a society which has to create scarcity to save its members from starvation, to whom abundance spells disaster, and to whom unlimited energy means unlimited power for war and destruction, there is an ominous cloud in the distance though at present it be no bigger than a man’s hand.”
—Arthur Stanley Eddington (1882–1944)
“By this unprincipled facility of changing the state as often, and as much, and in as many ways as there are floating fancies or fashions, the whole chain and continuity of the commonwealth would be broken. No one generation could link with the other. Men would become little better than the flies of a summer.”
—Edmund Burke (1729–1797)